FUNDS house Aberdeen Asset Management has trimmed its stake in a £210 million shopping centre in the London commuter belt in an unusual deal with rival M&G.
The Scottish investment giant and M&G Real Estate , part of the Prudential, have formed The Two Rivers Limited Partnership.
The fund has acquired a 100% interest in the Two Rivers Shopping Park in Staines-upon-Thames, formerly known as Staines, with each company taking a 50% share.
Previously Aberdeen had 60% and other investors 40%.
Aberdeen holds the stake in the centre, which is located in an affluent part of Surrey, on behalf of pension funds and their clients.
Simon Moscow, director, fund management at Aberdeen, said: "Two Rivers Shopping Park has consistently outperformed its benchmark since opening in 2001 and we are excited to be announcing our joint venture, which provides our client funds with direct access to a retail and leisure asset of the highest quality.
"Exposure to prime assets such as The Two Rivers Shopping Park is extremely valuable and we intend to further enhance that value with asset management initiatives going forward."
Two Rivers is a 380,000 square foot retail and leisure scheme. It sits on the edge of Staines and is anchored by retailers including John Lewis-owned grocer Waitrose, Boots and Next along with Vue cinemas.
Aberdeen will continue to manage the centre, as it has done since the Two Rivers scheme was developed in 2001.
Peter Langly-Smith of M&G Real Estate said: "We are very pleased to have gained exposure to this dominant shopping park. Opportunities to invest in hybrid assets of this scale and nature are rare, and reflect our desire to invest in properties that are well placed to outperform against a backdrop of an ever-changing retail landscape."
He said M&G plans further deals.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article